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I used to see newspaper ads for a get-rich-quick system by a used-car pitchman in L.A. What was that?

Joe Karbo sold horse-racing tips, Salton Sea real estate, and used cars on TV before writing The Lazy Man’s Way to Riches in 1973. Millions sent in $10 for his self-improvement ideas, which included yoga, positive thinking, and mail-order schemes. Karbo said each book cost him 50 cents, so you can see where the riches came from. “I’m a frustrated actor,” he once told this magazine. “That’s how I got into the whole thing.” Karbo died during a TV interview in 1980.